TREATMENT WITHOUT FILLING 179 



Nearly all our forest trees bear severe pruning 

 of this sort, and improve under it." Prof. Sar- 

 gent also insists on the importance of fertilization. 



It need hardly be said that these extracts do 

 not co^istitute complete advice as to when severe 

 pruning ought to be employed, nor full directions 

 for carrying out the work. 



This is one way in which the arboriculturist, 

 recognizing the impossibility or the prohibitive 

 expense of eradicating completely the decay in a 

 veteran tree, can defer the time of its dissolution 

 by a much less expensive, and yet perhaps no less 

 effective, treatment. Yet it would not do to 

 create the impression that severe pruning and 

 filling are alternative processes. If it is thought 

 that the tree will respond to the pruning treatment 

 it should be pruned. If, in addition, filling the 

 cavities promises to be successful and not too ex- 

 pensive, the tree should be filled. 



There are treatments, however, which are al- 

 ternatives to filling and which fall within the 

 realm of tree repair. Their purpose, for the 

 most part, is to secure those benefits of cavity fill- 

 ing which are most cheaply attained, while sacri- 

 ficing those less easily secured. Some are baldly 

 practical, seeking only to stop decay and giving 

 no thought to the appearance of the tree when the 

 work is done. Some of them, though not includ- 

 ing fillings, have been brought forward with the 



